Are the smaller, personal hosts a supplement income? How would I get started?

[Magic2K2]

You people that run webhosting services, is that your primary occupation or is just something you do on the side? I understand you have to make yourself available for support so it can take up more time than you could ever predict, but you could handle most of that from your regular job.

And, if I wanted to start a service, what would I need?

 

[Palm]

If you want to grow into a large scale hoting you have to dumb your job and get your self a cupp of coffee and start providing support.Its gonna be a long night.

 

[Technics]

Hi,

As a new company you won't need to give up your job. Wait until you have enough customers to provide food for you. If anything keep a part-time job or work from home so you have access to your computer.

Start as a reseller for a reputable company. Nothing worse than reselling for someone like Cihost blah blah ...

 

[UndergroundHost]

Begin by reselling until you build a strong client base. After you have enough customers, than look into buying your own server.

 

[Coight]

Hello Magic,

The Webhosting market is highly saturated at the moment. New startups/ resellers etc. They all offer such things as unlimited space and bandwidth which we know isnt available.

The hardest thing is making a name for yourself. People are reluctant to go with new webhosting companies, like ours because they do not know much about them.

Support is another major issue. The Webhosting market means that you have customers worlwide, often in different timezones, but you are still required to provide 24 hour tech support. We have three people currently working on tech support. Two run during Australian business hours, and one takes the night shift, we are looking into expanding into two on night shift.

To start a webhosting company is not easy. You dont really expect to make a profit within the first 3 months. It is a costly excercise, banking/merchant accounts etc.

Robert